Flightless and Sightless
by TwistyJinx in Summer
Summary: When given the chance to regain his eyesight, Iggy unknowingly gets involved in a scheme hatched by Itex to tear apart the flock and finally terminate the 'failed' subjects. Set somewhere between STWAOES and MAX. Implied Fax, possible IggyOC.
1. In which Iggy is left at a BestMart

**Iggy**

Sometimes I wonder why I let my mouth make sounds against my will. It would really help me avoid potentially disastrous events.

Especially when the event in question is shopping with Max.

See, when Max has to shop for groceries, it usually means stuffing as many food items as physically possible without it looking too suspicious and then booking it out of the store before security can catch us.

We're model kids, really. Upstanding citizens of society.

...God I could choke on my own sarcasm.

If you haven't been following Max's recount of our little adventures, there are six members of the 'flock', as we call it. Max is the leader and one of the oldest, with Fang as her stoic-yet-obnoxious right-hand man. The rest of us are pretty sure that those two are sucking face when they're alone, but we don't have any solid proof as of yet. Angel knows, something about it, but she won't spill the beans. Then there's me (Iggy), who is the third oldest and the token blind kid. I can cook and build bombs and get a fire started just about anywhere and make phenomenal bacon, but I'm still _blind_. It's no bueno.

Nudge is the next oldest at eleven, and she talks. A lot. She can hack into any computer and build cars out of scraps of metal, and she can feel the presence of people's emotions by touching stuff. Pretty cool, yeah? Then there's Gazzy and Angel. Gazzy is short for the Gasman, for...obvious reasons. Gazzy is a demolitions expert, which is big-word talk that means he blows stuff up like no one's business. I mean, he can make a bomb out of a paper clip, a used napkin and a package of unmixed pudding. I've seen it happen. Angel can basically do everything. She can read and control other peoples' minds, breathe underwater, and talk to fish. If you think being a teen is hard, try being around a seven-year-old who can read your mind. It is not pleasant, my friend. Gazzy and Angel are the only two out of the flock who are actually related to each other, but we're all a family. Especially after finding out that our real families kind of sucked. And the best part is that we even have a lovesick flying, talking dog!

We're not dysfunctional or anything, I swear!

See that? More sarcasm. Sarcasm is my favorite emotion.

Back to business. So I (for some reason lost on me) agreed to go shopping with Fang and Max. Nudge was finally old enough to be considered old enough to watch Angel and Gazzy, a job that formerly belonged to me.

Ironic, I know. But I'd pick listening to Nudge talk my ear off over shopping with Max any day. Especially in this instance.

You see, dear reader, when I take part in Maximum Ride's shoplifting excursions, I am in charge of distracting the guards to give Max and Fang enough time to get out without attracting too much attention. I do this by milking my disability and pulling the guards away from the front doors, and when done correctly, Max and Fang get out without having to drop as much and thus we get to actually eat as much as need be to sustain us. Us mutant bird kids burn more calories than a chemical fire in California, so we have to eat a lot as a result.

"Young man, can I help you with something?" This guard is a total sap. You know how there are just people you just _know_ are total pushovers? This guy would be exhibit A for that. I almost felt bad about the criminal activities I was helping with, but then I remembered that it was for my survival, which, y'know, is kind of important to me, so I didn't feel nearly as bad.

I'm basically guiltless in this.

"I can't find my sister." True enough, I didn't know where Max was, and I don't think anyone gives me enough credit for how awesome I am. I should add 'being a badass actor' to the list of things that I can do. 'Cuz I friggin' owned. I made my voice a little shaky and made it sound like I was kind of afraid even though I usually pass for being sixteen or seventeen. But I'm blind. So it's totally cool. I would have liked to see the look on this guy's face, though. It would have rocked to see how well I was fooling him.

"Where did you last see her?" ...Really? I mean- did he just? Did he really just say that? Oh snap. I stared meaningfully in what I gathered to be his direction until he finally noticed what I was telling him without actually saying anything. The guard did a sharp intake of breath.

"Oh. I'm...I'm so sorry, m'boy. I didn't mean to offend-" I cut him off rather smoothly, "Don't worry about it. I'm used to it by now. I think we were in the produce section last..." Pete the guard (I didn't actually know his name, but Pete seemed like a good name to use) took my arm and led me towards said section of produce, and behind me I could hear Max's footsteps squeak lightly on the linoleum. I figured Fang was with her, but his ninja-feet moved so quietly that I couldn't hear him. It's criminal how often he uses that against me.

"Hold it right there! You have to pay for that!" That was not Pete the guard who said that. Which could only mean that...

Shit.

There were two guards? Small towns shouldn't have that much security. What the hell.

Max would hound me for that later.

"Iggy! Up and away!" I heard Max yell over the usual dull roar of Best Mart. Now, while I heard her yell this, I felt the grip from Pete the guard's bony old-man hand tighten as Max and Fang were caught. Usually this posed no problem; today, for some reason, my mind refused to understand the whole 'up and away' concept. The entire scene happened in less than ten seconds, and I heard Max and Fang running and doing their up and away, leaving me in Best Mart with Pete.

"Wait right here sonny, while I go report this." Scratch that, I was left alone with no one to keep me company. Pete ran off, probably to report the bird-kid sighting, but that really didn't matter because they LEFT. ME. ALONE.

Yeah. Not good, like, at all.

I don't even have anything to entertain myself with. Like matches, or brail porn.

Well, I can't actually read brail, but the idea of porn that a blind person such as myself can read sounded pretty damn good.

The idea of it cheered me up a little, and with no reason to stick around in the store, I made my way outside and sat down on the curb to wait for one of the flock to come get me.

What's funny without being even remotely funny is that this happens a lot more than Max likes to admit. Everyone forgets that I can't see sometimes, and situations like this happen. I never say anything about it, but it really bugs the crap out of me. I'd love to be able to see so that they won't have to forget that I can't, but sometimes...

Whatever. I'm cool. Calm as those Hindu cows that Tyler Durden talks about in _Fight Club_.

That's right. _Fight Club_. I love that movie. It is the epitome of badass.

I was probably waiting on the curb for about ten minutes when I suddenly became very aware of a phone ringing behind me. A few minutes went by and no one answered, leading me to believe that the ringing was coming from a pay phone.

Do you ever have those moments when a phone is ringing and you just _know_ that it's for you? That was totally me in this situation. My curiosity finally got the best of me and I followed the source of the ringing and picked up the phone, bringing it to my ear.

"Talk dirty to me." That's right. Who has two thumbs and no filter? This guy.

"Is this Iggy?" See? Phone sense works! I suppressed the urge to laugh and answered.

"Who wants to know?" Cue suspicious tone in my voice there.

"Someone who can help you out. Someone who _wants_ to help you." I snorted again. Snorting is manly. I always feel a little manlier when I snort at people.

"Oh? How's that?" I asked with an accidental yet totally perfect yawn to give an air of confident nonchalance. To be honest, though, I was kind of weirded out. Strangers who call pay phones shouldn't know who they're talking to.

"I can give you sight again." Blindkidsayswhat? My jaw would have dropped, but instead I clenched it, my teeth grinding against each other in shock. I was unable to form anything close to a real sentence, so instead I tilted my head back and blinked a few times, letting the sun hit my face; I was probably staring right at it.

"Who are you?" I asked after regaining my train of thought. The man on the other side of the line laughed, and it creeped me out.

"Just someone who is very interested in your condition and what you're doing to help save the world. You could say we're kindred spirits in that aspect." What, we're both blind?

...Oh wait. He wants to save the world.

"So why are you asking me exactly? Why not talk to Max?" The man on the other end laughed again, and I had to suppress a shudder from the sound. He really needed to tone down the creepiness. Like, majorly.

"Max is busy saving the world in her own way. But there are more groups than just the Coalition to Stop the Madness that want to help save the world. I happen to be part of one very important research facility that desperately needs funding. I could give you sight, and in exchange you could help my group gain the funding they need to help stop the madness." He sounded very confident in what he was talking about, but something was off. I couldn't put my finger on it, but something was weird.

The Iggy danger-o-meter wasn't going off, so I wasn't as uncomfortable as I could have been, and the idea of sight for something so simple sounded so nice...But would I have to leave the Flock? Would I ever see them again?

Seeming to read my mind, Senor Creepy answered the question in my mind. "You'd have to leave your family, but only temporarily. I would prefer to discuss this further in person, if you don't mind." My mind was reeling, and it must have impaired my judgment. If Max was here, she would have said no and abruptly hung up. But it sounded like a really good idea, and the consequences couldn't be _that_ bad, right?

"We're always traveling..." How would we meet? The traveling part seemed to be the biggest elephant in the room (for me, at least), but Senor Creepy was completely unfazed by this.

"Don't worry about that. Can you get away on Friday? I can arrange for you to be picked up." I should have noticed how weird that was, but I was so focused on being able to see again that it rolled off me. I was having memories about when I could see, seeing the whitecoats and the dog crates and needles...they weren't the greatest memories, but they were the only ones I had of my sight.

"How will you know where I am?" I asked dumbly, not really expecting a serious answer. Weirdos like this guy never gave actual answers.

"I have my ways. Friday then." With that, Senor Creepy hung up. I dropped the phone, dizzy with the prospect of what my possible future. I was even doing the world a favor, right?

"Iggy! Sorry I'm late!" I heard Nudge's voice from my left, and I stepped away from the phone in time to avoid her questioning me. I'm such a smooth operator of such things, you see. Or, maybe, like me, you can't.

Geddit? Blind kid joke!

Nudge tapped my hand twice, and I followed her footsteps until we were in a safe enough area to up and away.

"Watch out for branches above you during takeoff." She warned, and I nodded, carefully taking off. Which is basically impossible.

It was as we were flying towards the camp we were staying at that I realized the one hole in my plan: Angel.

Angel, being able to read minds, would know that I was planning something Max would not like, would tell Max, who would then shut me down and put me on house arrest or something. Unlike Nudge, I don't have the power of the Bambi eyes to persuade people with. Being blind only gets you so far.

Avoiding Angel's powers would be like trying to set a brick on fire: Hard as fnick but not impossible to do.

...That's what she said.


	2. In Which Bacon is Made at Ungodly Hourse

**Letty**

"The seed is planted. All we can do now is wait." Does Zamboni realize how many unintentional sex-laden references he makes? He sounded like a total creeper on the phone two minutes ago, and now he pulls this? Someone gag me with a piece of bacon. That way I'll die in delicious agony.

My ears twitched at a mouse moving under the floorboards, one flicking to the right and the other flicking forward. Having an enhanced sense of hearing can get really annoying. I mean, have you ever been startled awake because someone sneezed from all the way down the hall? I have. The only real upside is the orgasmic experience mutant hearing gives to listening to music. It's sex for your ears. You get, like, an eargasm or something.

"Letty!" Zamboni snapped, causing me to jump a little; apparently he'd been monologuing again and expected me to listen. He should know by now how distracted I get, especially since it's more or less his fault.

"Come again?" I would have apologized, but I honestly didn't care enough about what he was saying to really try hard enough. He gave me a patient look and smiled in a creepy fashion.

"How's our flying friend doing?" He asked, his voice too cheerful for his own good. Creep.

"You just got off the phone with him, didn't you?" I asked, not hiding my annoyance. Why should I? He only asks about blind-mutant-kid every ten minutes or so. The doctor's response was two minutes of completely uninterrupted eye contact with a level gaze that terrified me. The two minute mark was a new record, and finally I gave in and rolled my eyes, staring off and letting them cloud over, willing my sight to 'see' the 'flock'.

Iggy landed dangerously close to the girl he had been flying with (Nudge, I think her name is). He sat down and was almost immediately handed a sandwich made of a bunch of unidentifiable things apparently assumed to be food by the little blond boy (The Gasman. What kind of name is that?). Iggy, without even thinking about what he was eating, inhaled the sandwich and held his hand out for another one, and in under a minute he'd eaten four, the others close behind on sandwich consumption count.

And here I thought I ate a lot.

"I'm sorry we left you, Iggy. I thought you were right behind us, and by the time we realized you weren't with us it was too late to go back." The leader, Max, made me want to punch a baby. Blind or not, you don't leave a member of your family behind. I mean, I guess it was sort of for the best, seeing as they were able to haul ass and bring back a boatload of food for the rest of them, but still. It's just not cool.

"It's cool. I didn't get in any trouble and no one realized that I was connected to you shoplifting hooligans." Iggy replied coolly, his face making a goofy smile. From the way he was acting, you'd think I was more cheesed off about this than he was. Tall, dark and brooding boy (he has some weird name like Sabretooth or something tooth related. Oh yeah! Fang!) snorted from his little corner away from everyone else but still near Max.

They totally eat each other's faces off when no one's around. I only wish that I hadn't had to learn about it while trying to sleep.

But more on that later! The flock lapsed into silence until Max remembered something apparently important and began dancing around like a crazed crack whore.

...Okay not really, but it would have been funny. She just started jumping a little.

"Oh! Nudge! Iggy! I haven't told you the awesome news!" Nudge and Iggy looked up, Nudge feeding off of Max's excitement and Iggy looking completely confused about the sudden mood change.

"Ella sent Fang a message on his blog inviting us to eat to Thanksgiving dinner with her and Dr. Martinez. We're welcome to stay as long as we want until the CSM officially gets up and running." Creepy mind reading girl Angel droned, and I could really only assume that she had been reading Max's mind and said it before Max could to be an asshole. That kid is weird.

"Really? That's so exciting!" Nudge squealed, though I couldn't see what the big deal was. It wasn't like this Martinez chick is Nudge's mom or anything.

"Sweet. Free food." Iggy said through a mouthful of mystery sandwich. Nudge began chattering away about what she'd do when they got to Mesa, and with no reason to subject myself to the torture of shopping-talk, I 'pulled' myself away from the flock and returned to Zamboni and the house.

"They're going to Mesa, Arizona for Thanksgiving dinner this weekend. If I interpreted the conversation right, then they'll probably be there for a while. The cards tipped in your favor." I reported, not even bothering to disguise my boredom. I wanted to sleep, and this was keeping me awake. Why can't Zamboni just hire people to track and follow this guy around, anyway?

"You're ability will be a powerful asset to what my friends are trying to do, Letty." He told me, patting my shoulder. I snorted and folded my arms.

"Why is Iggy so important?" I asked as my reply to his...compliment? I gave up on trying to dissect this guy a long time ago.

Zamboni didn't say anything, but merely nodded, disappearing to his study. I followed suit, only disappearing into my room. Thanksgiving was in three days, which means that I had three days to get to Mesa to contact Iggy and get his final answer on whether or not he wanted to work with Zamboni and get his sight back.

Now, you're probably really confused about everything, but fret not: I come with handy-dandy instructions. See, I'm not entirely human. Ninety-eight percent of my DNA is human, but the other two percent is Vulpes- fox DNA. I was the only subject to survive the grafting process, and the only subject to undergo the testing that Iggy and his predecessors went through. Iggy was one of two survivors, but the only one to go blind as a result. The other died before the results could properly manifest. After Iggy went blind from the surgery, the doctors got wise and realized that the effects were going to be the same as long as they kept using subjects grafted with avian DNA. So then they thought, 'Hey! This fox-hybrid kid hasn't been completely traumatized by the effects of being a mutant, let's see how it works on her!'

Obviously, I'm still alive and I can see, so we can infer that the experiments went well. My 'sight' manifested when I was seven; Iggy was eight. But what is this ability of 'sight' that I keep rambling about?

Dr. Eli Zamboni apparently wants to save the world. To help out with that, he wanted to be able to see what people were doing to help prevent harm to the Earth and to also figure out what his fellow billionaires were doing in their spare time. So, he commissioned the School (or Itex, as it is more popularly known) to develop his own special mutant to do just that. After they finally got a successful subject with the ability to 'see' manifested properly (me), Zamboni plucked me out of the School and brought me to live the spoiled caged bird life while checking on his rivals and Iggy. Now, I can see other places other than where I'm at by focusing my thoughts on something. Let's say I need to see what Iggy's doing. I think about him really hard, and I'll temporarily go blind while my 'perception' goes to wherever he is. I can't see where I am when I'm looking somewhere else, and because of that I run a risk of going blind. I can't see the future; I just see other places, other things happening at the same time of where I am. Make any sense? I don't even know how it works. I mean, one minute I'm watching TV and the next I'm watching the Gasman build a bomb out of a paperclip, a piece of paper and a package of unmixed pudding. It's confusing and frustrating and all I'm certain of is that Zamboni is behind all of it.

Now, my ability of 'sight' can be useful as long as I can control it. Unfortunately, I am very easily distracted and I'll end up accidentally switch my perception to somewhere else if I let my mind wander. This happens quite a bit, unfortunately, and as a result it makes life rather difficult.

Fun, yeah?

No. Not fun.

So here I am now, working for a man who wants to take over the world and has a creepy obsession with a blind bird-kid. Now, I've watched Iggy grow up and most of my life is full of memories of his. Talk about an identity crisis, right? You have no idea how annoying it can get. Every day the 'flock' as they call themselves constantly runs from just about everyone and then manages to get themselves tangled into messes they don't need to be in, and then they just go and complain about it. Now I can understand them being a little pissed up until the point where Max learned she had a mom and joined the Coalition to Stop the Madness or whatever it's called, but now that they're doing that they're putting themselves under less than satisfactory living conditions. They have no right to complain about it!

Also, since they were free from Itex, they offically had the one thing that I wanted more than anything: Freedom.

I guess we're all complaining about something.

About ten minutes later I was in my room, willing myself to sleep without going off and 'seeing' someone else go to bed or have sex or something.

...Ew. Just. Ew.

Luckily for me (not) my mind is incapable of doing anything even remotely close to what I want, so right as I was about to fall asleep my vision went dark for a few moments before blurring into focus, and the setting? You guessed it: The flock.

"C'mon guys, we've got a long flight ahead of us tomorrow. I want to be able to get there a few days early to help mom out with Thanksgiving dinner preparations. So everyone get to bed. That means you, Gazzy! No building bombs in the dark. You might burn the forest down. Again." Max was making rounds around the fire where each member of her makeshift family was sleeping, doing various night-time-tucking-in procedures. Nudge was already asleep next to Iggy, who was reclining against a tree, his sightless eyes gazing into the flames.

You have to admit the poetic beauty of that was pretty awesome. I amaze myself.

Gazzy and Angel were curled up next to each other, and after Max tucked them in she walked over to where Fang was sleeping and spent a few moments longer than necessary to stare at him meaningfully or something. Can you say sexual tension? You could cut it with a freakin' knife. And have I mentioned that they're always trying to eat each other's faces off when not around the others? Seriously, Fax, get a room already.

Max finally moved past Fang and went to her own sleeping area-place, and soon everyone was asleep. I was hoping that since everyone was asleep my mind would take the hint and go back home to momma, but apparently not. Looking around, I noticed one thing off: Angel was still awake, and she was _looking at me_. Not just looking in the general direction that my sight was coming from, but right. At. Me. I've never been intentionally stared at while having an out-of-body experience, so you can imagine how completely weirded out I was. But hold on to your horses, kids, 'cuz it gets better!

_I see you._ I heard Angel's voice _in my head_ before being physically forced back into my sight and pretty abruptly knocked unconscious.

Note to self: Be wary of angelic-looking seven-year-olds with wings.

There are only two things in the world that make mornings good and dispel all evil associated with waking up: Bacon and coffee. So can you guess what I was doing at five in the morning with flagrant disregard for anyone else in Zamboni's mansion?

If you guessed brewing coffee and making bacon, give yourself a pat on the back, since you're sure as hell not getting any of my bacon. Now, I didn't really need to leave for my jaunt to Arizona until about noon if I wanted to get there by Friday, but I like to get an early start so I can have a few hours/days of freedom before the doc shows up and I'm whisked away to do his bidding. I could have waited for Franzeska or Olaf to wake up (Zamboni has some weird obsession with Russia, so all of his maids/butlers are of Russian descent. Where he finds them is a mystery to me) and make a breakfast that Zamboni would smile upon, but I am both impatient and picky about my bacon and coffee so I charged forth to do it myself.

See, I love chewy bacon. With a fiery passion that makes the sun look like frickin' Antarctica. No one can make chewy bacon as well as I can, so I save everyone the trouble and just make my own food most of the time. When seven AM rolled around, I had a plethora of bacon sandwiches stuffed my bag for food on the way and two pots worth of coffee in my hand. I was ready to rock.

"Make sure you find Iggy before I arrive on Sunday. I want to let him have Thanksgiving weekend to make his final decision, which will be yes." HOLY RAPTOR JESUS WHAT THE HELL. That was exactly what I replied with as the doc spoke quietly from behind me. He's a freaking ninja, I swear. He shouldn't even be awake right now! I could tell he was fighting back a comment about my 'Holy Raptor Jesus what the hell' comment and merely smiled his weirdo-pedophile smile.

"How do you know he'll say yes? He loves his family way too much to leave them the way you plan him to." I didn't quite say this; it was more like a grunt than anything else. A grunt that formed a coherent sentence, but a grunt nonetheless.

"Because I know Iggy, and I know how much he values his sight. He wants to help Max save the world, and with sight he won't feel like a burden. Iggy wants to be equal to everyone else, and he views his impairment as a huge handicap that limits how useful the flock thinks he is. He'll jump at this opportunity." Is it weird that even though he explained everything in a completely sensible way I still feel like that was really cryptic? Am I the only one here? Yeah?

...Shut up and go choke on something. I started out the front door, ignoring the glaring sunrise that probably looked very nice, but since it's the morning and I'm an ass in the morning I didn't see it as anything more than that big bright thing making it hard to see. I'm a real peach, huh?

"Be safe! Don't trip over yourself!" I completely disregarded Zamboni and took off into the forest, nothing in my ears but the _whoosh_ of air as I barreled through the trees, hopping over tree trunks like a ninja. Max might think that flying is the ultimate rush, but she's obviously never raced through a forest at over a hundred miles an hour, barely missing the tree trunks whizzing past you and having the threat of tripping and dying. That, my friend, is the ultimate rush.

If I paced myself I'd be in Arizona by tomorrow night, which would put me at about the same time that it would take for the flock to get there. Since I'm a ninja creeper, I took the time to stop and check on the bird-kids to gauge how long it would take them to fly to Mesa. This way I'd have something to occupy my time while I ran. It was a race of sorts, and I planned on winning. So I ran, far past the hunting ranges and into pure wilderness, enjoying the blurry scenery as I raced past. As I ran, I couldn't help but feel like I forgot something very important back at Zamboni's house, but I eventually shrugged it off after the concentration it took to try to remember almost resulted in my untimely demise.

I mean, even bacon isn't more important than my survival to enjoy it, right?

...I'll have to rethink that one through.


	3. In Which Iggy is Caught in a Net

**Iggy**

Have you ever been woken up by a pterodactyl? If you have, there's something wrong with you and I suggest you get help. If you haven't, then you're incredibly lucky and pray that there is never a second coming of the dinosaurs. Thought that'd be really cool, yeah? No. It isn't cool. Not in the least.

"What the SHIT?" I jerked awake and flung forward, my head bashing into what I assumed was the Gasman's head, seeing (not really) as his voice was repeating the word 'ow' over and over again. I bit back a slew of unsavory words to accompany 'shit'. It didn't work out too well.

See that nice use of the word 'slew'? And the mental image of me waking up to an actual pterodactyl is pretty funny, too.

"Language, Ig." I heard Max choke out through her laughter, and it took me a few seconds to realize that everyone was laughing at me, which means that they were a in on it. Lousy gits, the lot of them.

Yes, I am excercising my use of British sounding phrases, so sue me.

Actually, don't. I'm a mutant bird kid and I'm blind. It'd never hold up in court.

"What in the name of all things Bacon was that noise, Gaz?" I leaned forward and grasped my head, which now sported a lovely welt that hurt like crazy. Gazzy laughed and made the noise again, and if I could see I'd probably see him smiling so wide that all his teeth would be visible.

"Haven't you ever heard a pterodactyl before?" He asked, his tone the pure sound of falsified innocence. I snorted.

"Yeah, because we deal with dinosaurs SO often." I retorted sarcastically. Not only did I not just reply to him, but I retorted. With great sarcasm.

God I'm awesome.

Gazzy probably rolled his eyes because he didn't answer, but I'd lost interest in the conversation after realizing how overwhelmingly hungry I was. I stuck my hand out as a signal that someone should give me food, and two seconds later a protein bar of some sort dropped into my open palm and then quickly disappeared into my mouth. Followed by two more.

Then a bottle of water.

I love food.

"I'm gonna go get Fang." Gazzy announced after about ten minutes of morning silence.

"Alright, just watch out for the t-" Max's voice was cut off by the sound of a Gasman hitting a tree with considerable force. Tell me, am I a bad person for laughing at the sheer karma/irony of the situation? I mean, c'mon. He wakes me up without needing to and then as a result he hits a tree. Sounded like it hurt a lot.

"You okay Gaz?" Holy crap when did Fang show up? Gazzy didn't answer verbally so I assumed that he just nodded or something.

"Alright guys, go pee or whatever, we leave in five." Max announced in a very official voice, which usually meant "go-pee-whether-you-have-to-or-not-because-we're-not-stopping-for-anything-short-of-death" in Max-speak. I'll never understand her, honestly.

Several hours later we were high above Ohio (according to Nudge), enjoying the pure freedom that one experiences when flying. The sun was a welcome warmth in the unseasonal cold April.

Stupid unseasonal weather.

We'd had smooth sailing since we left, so naturally some sort of random unnecessary attack was imminent.

Look at me using big words like imminent. But yeah, there was no way that we couldn't be attacked soon. That would mess with the normalcy of the Flock. It just doesn't happen.

"What's that?" Nudge asked from the opposite side of me; we were flying in a standard V-formation.

"Looks like trouble." I replied, stonefaced. Completely deadpan.

Silence. Max is probably rolling her eyes at me.

"I'm rolling my eyes at you, Ig." Who's good? I'm good, that's who.

"Whatever. I see it too, Nudge, and whatever it is, it's coming in fast. Prepare yourselves for a fight." Why is it that anytime Max sees something mysterious flying towards us she assumes we'll have to fight it? Oh yeah, 'cuz we usually do.

Minutes ticked by, all of them itching with anticipation. Really sucks, that anticipation. You keep expecting something to happen, but it doesn't, and then it strikes like a Gasman fart in the dead of night.

Pure terror.

And then: "Scatter!" I flew up without hesitation, every not-sight sense kicking into high gear to account for my inability to see my attackers.

More anticipation. I'd never tell anyone, but fighting always made me anxious. I could fight just as well as anyone else in the Flock, but not being able to see who I'm fighting means I do a helluva lot of guess work. Sounds get mixed up during brawls, and I'm always secretly worried that I'll accidentally punch Nudge or Angel. I mean, it's kind of cool that no one can tell how much I can't see, but at the same time it sucks royal pig balls.

"Iggy watch out!" By the time I heard Max's warning I was already tumbling through the air, struggling to regain my balance.

Alright, kiddies, can you guess what just happened? Did Iggy just...:

A) Get hit by a forty-pound sack of bacon

B) Make out with a hot Russian mail-order bride or

C) Get punched in the face

If you guessed C, you are most awesomely correct! I bet you didn't see that coming, right? I didn't see it coming either.

Get it? More blind kid jokes. Ha ha. Anyway, while I regained height from my hit, I took the opportunity to get some explosives, since I make bombs like Jon and Kate make drama.

My latest demolitions invention was a special kind of adhesive grenade. The adhesive doesn't kick in until the bomb is activated, and once it sticks, it _sticks_. Pretty sweet, huh?

My attacker came back for round two, but before he could get me I did a badass aerial maneuver over his head, sticking two bombs on his shell-like back.

Wait, shell? That guy had a turtle shell! My epiphany's usefulness was cut short after an explosion knocked me up a few yards. I hate it when I get inconvenient movement-stopping realizations that end up getting me either injured or turn out to be completely useless.

I was knocked from my thoughts when I barely managed to dodge two more weird enemies zing by me. I couldn't even hear them flying! It's like someone cloned Fang's ability to be all shadow-like and pimped out a bunch of different mutants with it after adding bird to whatever they were originally mutated with. Or something. I might have been able to dodge them the first time, but before I could rebound and attack they rebounded faster, one grabbing me (Avian with some kind of cat, judging by the not-wolfish fur) while the other (something really friggin' scary that I didn't want to imagine) beat the living shit out of me. I didn't actually shit, but it felt like I would. It was like having to watch Brittany Spears' return performance while being used as a punching bag.

I finally managed to get a kick in and knock scary-guy off of me, and then threw the cat-dude over my shoulder, conveniently sending him flying into the other guy. I don't know if I took them out for the count or not, but I was a little preoccupied with the mass amounts of blood coming from my now-busted lip and probably broken nose. The freaky mutant guy could have at least thrown a few punches to my stomach. No, wait a minute, he did.

"Hi there! You're gonna fall now, okay?" Dear sweet Bacon that girl is terrifying. Anyone who can send someone to their deaths with such a cute, sweet voice can't be good. I'm sure Angel's cute as a button but she scares the willies out of me sometimes. Seriously.

I actually managed to sense another weird enemy before he/she/zhir attacked me, and managed to dodge by leapfrogging over them, attaching a bomb to them before flying out of the bomb's attack range. What I wasn't expecting was a whole ambush of 'em with a net ready for just such an occasion that a mutant bird kid unwittingly flies into it. Sometimes I think these assholes set up traps specifically to catch the blind kid.

"Blind kid caught in a net!" I called out to anyone close enough to hear and act upon my predicament. Fang was the one to answer my call for help, for all the good it did.

"Hold on, Ig!" Fang yelled back from about twenty feet below me. I snorted, so taken back by the sheer stupidity of that single statement to even try to keep flying; the baddies had me securely tied up in this nice, uncomfortable net.

"Yeah, 'cause I have so many places I can go in my current position, Fang. I'll try my best not to move around too much." I replied with as much sarcasm as one person can put into a sentence. Let me tell you, that is quite a bit of sarcasm. There was silence except for the sounds of the others fighting and Nudge complaining about a broken nail.

"I'm rolling my eyes at you, Ig." Goddamn I knew that was coming! How is it that they manage to do that even in the middle of a fight? Geez. The time it took for that moment could've been spent saving me! Fang did indeed come to my rescue moments later, punching out mostly everyone until there was one guy left holding my helpless ass in the net.

"Why couldn't you have done this earlier? Honestly." I said irritably, just being an ass at this point. If Fang can do the 'I'm rolling my eyes at you" thing during battle, then I can be a douche. I went there.

"Just shut up and be thankful that I'm saving your sorry ass." Yeah, this is my fault.

"Well I'm sorry I didn't see this coming." Fang didn't answer but started punching things again. At this point two things happened very quickly.

First, the guy holding me dropped the net with me tangled in it, and before Fang could catch me I was free falling at a very fast speed towards the ground. Secondly, I found myself unable to get free, and since no one had really noticed I was falling, the chance of being saved seemed slim. I love it when stuff like this happens, don't you?

"Iggy!" Max screamed from way above me. I heard her go into a dive to grab me, but when she caught up to me and grabbed hold of the net, the weight of me falling versus the weight of her holding me back snapped the part of the rope she was holding, tangling my wings even more and making it really hard to even keep my wings out. She screamed again, but before she could start her engine again I had blacked out, my last thought as I hit a forest being:

This is why I hate Mondays.


	4. In Which Letty is Picked Up by a Creeper

**Letty**

Shit.

Seriously, shit.

Like, holy shitcakes to the power of bacon. The shit that shit has a shit about. That's a lot of shit.

Then again, you'd probably react similarly if the person you're kind of supposed to protect from dying for the agenda of an evil dude starts falling with his wings out of commission. I mean, I didn't go to school, but even I know that's a bad thing. Oh lordie this is bad.

Zamboni's gonna kill me. He's gonna freak out that his mutant mercenaries are attacking his beloved Iggy, but afterwards he'd kill me.

Oh? You mean those mutants attacking Iggy are working for Zamboni? Damn straight. Every wealthy businessman has a secret army of cloned mutants. I thought the memo had gone out.

I snapped out my mental rant and shook my sight back into my eyes, and immediately took off to find where Iggy was going to land to try to stop him from dying. I shot like a rocket through the woods, dodging over fallen trunks and traipsing under branches. I was a freakin' blur to the naked eye, were anyone in the forests of Illinois at the time. I stopped to try to see where he was falling, but my mind had other plans and decided to show me how Max was handling the situation. Which was really weird, since I usually never paid much attention to her and now all of a sudden my subconscious cares?

Hey, subconscious? If you know something I don't, now would be a great time to let me in on the secret. Thanks.

Max had just finished off a hybrid of a bird and deer or something like that when she heard Fang yell Iggy's name. It took her about five seconds to take in what was happening and about two seconds to act on it. Within ten seconds of his fall, Max had taken out another mercenary and was diving at supersonic speeds after Iggy. Since they weren't around any kind of civilization, the flock had been flying a little lower than usual, so Iggy wasn't all that far from hitting the tall canopy extending over the Illinois country side. Max threw her arm out and willed herself to close the last space between them and caught hold of the net holding Iggy. She extended her wings out and folded them to catch the wind and pull her up, but the force of her pulling up on the net and the weight of Iggy's fall caused the net to snap.

This was when Iggy came alive. The whole time he'd been falling he was silent, his sightless eyes wide in Max's view, but now he had a second wind of energy, and he used it. Iggy began to flap his wings and free himself of the net, but he was running on adrenaline and he only managed to tangle the ropes in his wings and in the next moment he crashed through the trees and disappeared from Max's grasp. The whole thing happened in under three seconds, which wasn't enough time for Max to fly back down and catch him again, and when he disappeared Max started screaming.

"IGGY!" She tried to break through the canopy but it was too thick of anything short of a fall to get through. Branches weaved through, though a large hole was broken branch and twigs. As much as it obviously pained her to say it (or think of it), Max knew she couldn't get through there. She had to find another opening. So she did.

"No." I breathed as I came to, and I was off again. I didn't really know where he was, but the loud crash that followed just after I came back to myself was him then finding him wouldn't be a problem. I ran, and soon I was upon the crumpled heap of rope and feathers that appeared to be Iggy. I looked up, and saw a piece of his shirt and feathers hanging off a branch, so he wasn't dead. Max plus the force of the branches hitting him and getting caught had to have broken his fall enough to just be really friggin' painful.

Keep telling yourself that, Letty. I cautiously picked my way over to him, and he was definitely out. He had various cuts and scratches on his arms and face, but other than that he was okay. He would be in a craptastic amount of pain when he woke up, but he would live.

"Iggy!" Shit, it's Max! I pulled a swiss army knife I found in a camp ground like two weeks ago (you never know when this kind of stuff comes in handy, and right now was perfect testament) and began cutting away at the ropes tangled in his wings. I could hear Max calling Iggy's name, and my heartbeat doubled its pace as I had an adrenaline overload. My hands started shaking and soon I had almost all the rope cut. I finished the last connected net near his wing joint, which was where I screwed up. As I yanked the knife back to put it away, I gave my hand a seriously gnarly gash. Forgetting where I was and what I was doing, I swore very loudly, and Iggy's eyes popped open; for a moment it was like he _saw_ me.

Then, y'know, I remembered that he can't actually see anything. The whole 'being blind' thing.

Iggy started to move and I scrambled back into the shadows of the forest, pressing myself against a tree and held my breath.

"Iggy!" Max came bounding onto the scene, and Iggy made a grunting sound to let Max know she was about to step on him.

"Iggy, you're okay!" She looked like she was about to cry, but quickly composed herself for her leader-stoic persona she's incapable of doing well.

"'Okay' is a relative term, but I'm alive." Iggy replied in a strained voice. I missed the rest of the conversation because I had made my escape but I think Iggy had asked something about if Max had heard anything or something. Who knows.

Sometimes having the last bacon sandwich of the day makes you want to cry. If I was capable of normal emotions (just kidding) then I'd probably be bawling. But I hadn't planned on keeping them longer than a day and bacon sandwiches don't last a long time very well. But still, I was a long ways from any kind of civilization and in the middle of a desert in Texas and wishing I had taken the Flock's route through Nebraska, so I needed to keep my food as long as I could. I don't even remember how I got here. Or when it became nighttime.

Now that I think about it, it's really dark, and by dark I mean like advanced darkness. This is the kind of dark that dark is afraid of. Creepy.

It had to be around ten at night, and I planned on stopping when it got dark but I landed in this desert in between Bumsville and Nowhereland. So that plan is out the window. The Flock had already found a place to stay for the night, and I couldn't stop until I found a town.

Wait, what was that?

...That was a car. Cars mean a road, and a road means...

A town would fall along the road eventually. Immediately I began the trek towards the road, and about thirty minutes later I was walking on the shoulder, slightly more optimistic about life. Finally overcome by hunger and the need for bacon I ate my final bacon sandwich, which gave me an extra boost of energy to get me to a motel.

"Hey!" Who the hell would be driving at this time of night in the middle of nowhere?

...This guy. Creeper to the max, with a creeper 'stache and gross acne and just altogether made me want to cringe. I adjusted my hat to cover my ears and kept walking. Senor Creepermeister didn't get that I was ignoring and followed me.

"Hey, a kid like you shouldn't be walking out here so late at night. There's a town ten miles up the road - lemme give you a ride."

I bet you would, you pedophile. I shook my head, trying to look courteous.

"Thanks but no thanks. I'm fine." Senor Creeper frowned, looking through the windshield with his look of deep contemplation. Then he sighed and looked back at me.

"I won't try to force you, but there are gonna be people worse than me driving around soon. What a kid your age is doing out here so late without your parents is beyond me, but I got a daughter your age." Everything about this radiated "no get away go now now now" but for some inexplicable reason I found myself in Creeper (whose real name is Coop)'s backseat listening to The Smiths, which is always a pretty good thing.

The next thing I remember is waking up in a shabby motel fully-clothed vaguely remembering falling asleep in Coop's car and him getting this room for me before leaving. A note stood on the bedside table that read, quite simply: Your secret's safe with me.

Now I understand how perverted all that sounds, but I think my hat fell off last night while I was being moved from car-to-bed.

You gutter-minded perverts.

The rest of the journey was uneventful, save for an incident in New Mexico involving the police, an orangutan and an ice cream truck, but that's completely and embarrassingly irrelevant.

I ended up in Mesa a day later than I expected to, but it was only Thursday and Zamboni wasn't coming in 'til Sunday (Changed his mind about Friday I guess. We going to forget to mention Iggy's almost dying in the forest issue)

As soon as I go to Mesa I headed toward the foreclosed housing district and started preparing for, eventually, Iggy.

I only hope he'll still want to go through the surgery after yesterday.

I certainly would.


	5. In Which Iggy Wins a Porn Sweepstakes

**Iggy**

"Max, do you see anything over there?"

"No, why? Should I?"

"...No reason."

Imagine every conceivable swear word known to man and beast and alien and you'll have my thoughts for the past hour as we flew over Nebraska. Words can't even begin to explain how pissed off and in pain I was.

I couldn't fight because those weird mutant dudes were too quiet and I couldn't hear them properly; this wouldn't be an issue if I could see. I couldn't see where I was going when I dodged my bombs which led to my flying into a net and made me not only unable to fly but also a liability to the Flock. I bet no one even knew I knew what 'liability' means. To top it off I couldn't get free of the friggin' net or protect myself (the first part doesn't really have much to do with my being blind, but it really doesn't help).

And I couldn't see who saved me in the forest so I could thank them properly.

I definitely wasn't very happy with my situation. This was one of those 'life blows' moments that isn't very enjoyable and kind of induces the urge to punch small infants. Or make a bunch of starving children bacon and then take it away from them, leaving only the aroma to make them hungrier.

...Okay maybe not THAT mad, but I was pretty pissed. I could hear Angel flying next to me, and I knew before I felt her tap the back of my hand what she was going to say. I didn't even need mind reading powers.

"I know what you're thinking, and the answer is no. The other answer is I don't want to talk about it and please stop reading my mind while I'm having internal rants. Thanks." I was a bit harsher than I needed to be; I admit this. Doesn't mean I felt bad when I heard Angel's wings flap away with her defeated sigh. Kid shouldn't read minds that don't want to be read.

We landed in Mesa Thursday afternoon and found our way to Dr. M's house fairly quickly, what with our mutant bad-ass sense of direction. We're BAMF like that. Ella ran out to greet Max almost as soon as we hit the ground (for a girl as tiny as Gazzy says, she has pretty loud feet), and as soon as she was done screaming about how excited she was to see us we were suddenly attacked by a smell more heavenly than freshly made bacon: Fresh chocolate chip cookies prepared by none other than Dr. M.

Speaking of, how the hell does she manage to have cookies JUST popping out of the oven any time we come to visit? Does she just keep cooking them until we get there so no matter what they're just coming out of the oven? It's, like, sinister how well she does that.

SINISTER.

"Ella, let them breathe a little, will ya? They're probably tired and wanting to sleep." I heard Gazzy snort in agreement, but at the same time I said, "I think those cookies are a little more important than us resting. Just sayin'." I held up my hands and shrugged. Nudge made a noise of enthusiastic agreement from the left of me. Dr. M probably smiled and soon we were all piled in the kitchen wolfing down the cookies she'd made.

In a word, they were baconlicious.

Yes, baconlicious. Because bacon is the ultimate magical anything, so anything baconlicious is above any conceivable kind of awesome.

Can I get some applause for the word 'conceivable' here? That's a four-syllable word, people. C'mon.

OH. Speaking of sinister, that Zamboni dude should be using his magic to pick me up or something tomorrow. Which I STILL don't understand how he plans on doing that. Oh well. I'm pretty sure if I keep thinking about it Angel will pick up on it.

"Pick up on what?" HOLY SHIT HOW THE BACON DOES SHE DO THAT. I jumped three feet into the air (probably) and hit my head on a lamp in the hallway before I managed to compose myself enough to talk to her.

"GOD ANGEL WHAT THE HELL." I never said I was a nice kid. Besides, you try being blind and have a terrifying little girl sneak up on you in the midst of deep thought. Seriously.

"You were afraid I'd pick up on something you were thinking." Angel prompted helpfully. I pinched the bridge of my nose and took a few deep breaths. It's time for some Iggy-style lying and excuses.

"I, um, I won a contest from _Good Girls Doing Bad Things_ magazine, and I'm supposed to be picked up tomorrow to do a photoshoot or something for it." Who's good? I'm good. That's right. Smooth as fnickin' smoke. Angel took a breath, and I'm pretty sure she was scrutinizing me, but I don't think she caught onto anything.

"That's really gross, Iggy." Was all she said, and I heard her run off, probably to tell Max about it.

"Iggy you have to tell us when you enter sweepstakes for porn!" Max called from the living room.

"Is that what you had me fill out, Ig? I thought it was a library card or something?" Gazzy added. I snorted and replied to Gazzy's stupidity, "Because I have all the reasons in the world to own a library card." Is there a lot of sarcasm in my tone? Why yes, yes there is.

"...Shut up, Iggy." I love you to, Gasman. This is how the Flock shows affection, see? We point out each other's stupidity. It's awesome!

So the rest of the day was boring as hell, but full of cookies and bacon and magic (we had breakfast for dinner. A lot of bacon was made and eaten in a really short amount of time. Like you were expecting anything else?) I didn't expect to fall asleep as early as I did, but one minute I'm exchanging fart jokes with Fang and the next moment it's noon the next day.

Correction: It's noon and someone is banging on the door and yelling at me to wake up because there's someone at the door. Now, you may not know me very well since the Flock's sleep habits are not often touched upon from Max's point of view, but even though I can function off of as little as thirty minutes of sleep, I love to sleep in.

I love sleep in general, actually. Sleep, sleep, sleep. I love it. So when I don't have to get up two hours after I go to bed, I milk that for all it's worth. This particular Friday was just such an occasion.

"It's not even twelve-thirty! Tell them to come back later." I yelled back, my voice kind of muffled by the pillow my face was buried into. Yes, I'm comfortable sleeping this way, don't judge me.

"She says it's important so get out of bed!" I swear to bacon, Fang, I'm gonna-

Wait a minute, rewind what he just said. 'She says'. She. She means girl, girl means breasts, breasts means a reason to get out of bed. And Iggy is up!

...Not in that way. Shut up I know you were thinking of that too. I just woke up. Stop being dirty you perverts. Don't worry though, I won't tell anyone that you just imagined me with a hard-on.

"Sorry I took so long, what's up?" I asked, pulling on my windbreaker after getting dressed in record-breaking time. I leaned against the door frame and stared in Fang's direction so I wouldn't freak the girl at the door out.

"You're Iggy, I take it?" Well, she sounds cute enough. Kinda flat-toned, though. Not bubbly. Surprisingly young, probably no older than fifteen. Not someone I'd expect to be from some kind of porn magazine.

"Yeah, that's me. Are you here for the...?" I trailed off, and she picked up where I left off without missing a beat.

"Photoshoot? Yes. Though I wasn't expecting you to be so tall. Shall we? The boss doesn't like to be kept waiting." I nodded and moved to follow her out the door, but Fang grabbed my arm.

"You're a little young to be working for this sort of thing. How old are you?" He asked, his voice full of doubt about her. The girl probably shrugged or something offhanded like that, because there was a pause before she answered Fang's question.

"I'm thirteen, and I'm the head of the company's daughter. He asked me to come get Iggy because everyone else is busy right now." This girl is a capable liar, I'll give her that. It didn't sound rehearsed or anything. Fang slowly released my arm and tapped my hand twice, a silent indicator that I could go. The girl took my arm and 'led' me out of the house and down the steps, keeping a light hold until we reached the end of the block.

"Can your family still hear us?" She asked quietly; I think she was looking away from me, maybe back at the house? I couldn't tell.

"No. How did you-?" She cut me off mid-sentence, releasing my arm and quickening her pace. I didn't have to speed mine up to match her stride, which told me that she was really short. More than a foot shorter than me, at least. Either that or she's walking slowly at twice my stride.

"Not right now. My only priority right now is getting you to the boss. I'll answer anything you want me to answer after that." Well, there goes that conversation. I sighed and tried to glare meaningfully at her, but I'm pretty sure I missed her direction entirely. That or she's just not looking at me.

"Will you at least tell me your name?" Way to break the tension, Iggy. She already knew my name, so I at least wanna know hers. The silence meant that she was either debating whether to answer or not or trying to get a booger lodged really far up in her nose, but she answered after a moment.

"Letty. It's Letty."

"That's a weird name." She didn't respond, but she probably agreed with me. Then again, Iggy's not exactly a normal name either. It's better than my REAL name (James). I mean, I don't even look like a James, and I get the feeling that I was named after an author who got confused about where his book is going or something...Eh, probably not.

"IGGY! I'm so happy to see you! You took a little longer than I expected, Letty. We'll work on that later, though." This must be Zamboni. The walk down to wherever it is he's got his operation going was uneventful, and I'm pretty sure I fell asleep walking it was so boring. That Letty girl isn't one for conversation, that's for sure.

"Um, I'm sure if I wasn't blind I could say the same to you." I replied dryly, and Zamboni let out a really sinister and jolly kind of bellow-laugh. Really creepy.

"Well, if you decide to help my cause, that won't be a problem." My eyes widened so much it actually hurt.

"What exactly do you want from me?" I asked, my voice a few octaves higher than normal. I get a little squeaky when I'm surprised/excited, leave me alone. Zamboni slapped my back, knocking me forward a bit. He was stronger than I thought he'd be.

"The Coalition to Stop the Madness is not what it seems. Maximum's mother may have good intentions, but the CSM is doing more harm than good." He paused for effect, and then continued. "The benefactors funding the CSM are also putting money behind their enemies to gain more money."

"How does that work? I mean, if these people are giving money, how are they getting money back?" I asked, blatantly interrupting Zamboni before he could go on. Letty nudged me with her elbow and emitted a warning growl of sorts. Apparently that was a bad thing to do.

"When multimillion corporations fund charity projects like the CSM, a percentage of what they earn goes back to the benefactors. The more projects they put money behind, the more money they get back." He explained. If he was irked by my interruption, he wasn't letting it show in his voice. I raised my hand to ask another question (mostly to be an ass), and spoke at Zamboni's grunt to talk.

"So how does this make the CSM bad?" Zamboni let out another too-loud-too-long bellowing laugh before he continued his spiel.

"The CSM is giving their benefactors the money they need to redo the damage for the CSM's rivals. That, and I have a very reliable source that tells me that there are members of the Coalition making deals with oil and mining companies because they're not making enough money with their charity work."

"So it all boils down to greedy people wanting more money?" Letty chimed in from my left.

"Mmhmm. So that's where you come in, Iggy. You have skills and abilities that no one else possesses, and while Maximum and your family are clouded by the CSM, you're the only one who can truly understand the corruption your family can't fathom." Huh. So I'm the important one now? How weird. Is he even telling the truth? The CSM seemed like such an awesome thing, but the way he talks about it, it seems so...well, not as awesome. How can no one else see it? I mean, if it's so evil, why am I being told about it? And why now?

What if, like, everyone is hiding it from me because I can't actually see it?

"So what do you need from me?" I finally asked, after my train of thought derailed and silence took over, like, everything. Zamboni clapped his hands and grasped my shoulder really hard. There's probably going to be a bruise.

"I need you to say 'yes' and let me prep you for surgery." I looked in the direction of his voice. I didn't say anything; I just stared at him...or his direction.

"What?" Dumb question, yes. But no one ever said I was smart.

"Help me uncover the corruption behind the CSM and help me help the world. Help me to help you see again."

"Okay, but what are you going to do to help me see?" We stopped walking, and I assumed we were in front of the door; I felt a cold, steel door in front of me.

"Through this door is an operating room, where seven of the best eye surgeons in America are waiting for the word to start your operation. The surgery to fix your eyes. Agree to help me, and we'll prep you right now, and by this time tomorrow you'll be able to see. By Tuesday you'll be on your way to help save the world. You'll be on your way to _seeing_ the world." Zamboni is an awesome public speaker. He could woo a brick wall into destroying itself, I think. I mean, it's not like I'm doing anything wrong. I'm trying to help the planet, same as Max or anyone else. What's the worst that could happen?

"...Okay. I'll do it." I could hear Zamboni grinning like a maniac. He clapped my shoulder and led me into the operating room.

"Alright, Iggy. We'll need you to step into this room and change into this hospital gown, and we'll get you prepped from there." I took the thin gown and did as I was told.

I don't want to bore you with the medical crap, and I didn't understand half of what they were saying anyway, but the last thing I remember is laying on a cold table with this mask over my mouth, and I remembered the last memory I had of being able to see.

_Three scientists stood over me, blurry from the bright light behind them. I felt like I was falling asleep, and I remember being really scared. I could see their faces hidden by the surgical masks, and they were speaking quietly. Or maybe I was just going deaf. Slowly everything got blurry and dark. The last thing I saw was a scalpel hovering over my eyes._

That was my last memory of being able to see. It's kind of ironic that that'd be my last memory of being blind. The doctors had me count down after the mask was put over my mouth, and for a moment I remembered the school again and got freaked out, but before I could really freak, I fell asleep.

"Iggy, your rapid healing is truly a gift for you. It's been two days since your surgery, but you're ready to remove the bandages, I think." It was two days afterwards, I didn't feel any different and I couldn't see still, but the only difference was that there were bandages and whatnot all over my head, which actually kind of really hurt.

"That's awesome, seeing as these things kind of hurt." I replied bluntly, scratching at my head. I heard scissors cutting dangerously close to my ears, and slowly I felt the pressure on my head start to go away, until finally...

"Open your eyes, Iggy."

And I did.

A/N: Alright so now that I've gone through and tried to fix things I found wrong in the chapters, I'll be starting Chapter 6 soon, and will try as soon as possible to have it up for you, as I know you're all SO excited for Iggy. :D Love and Bacon.


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